Solve : Help! Confusing computer troubles :(?

1.	Solve : Help! Confusing computer troubles :(?
Answer» I left my computer on all night and in the MORNING it was off. When I turned it back on the tower itself was on and RUNNING but the monitor/keyboard/mouse were not on. I switched those parts ( monitor/keyboard) with a different computer's and still nothing. I thought that it might be a power supply issue but when I replaced the power supply still did the same thing. So I assumed it might be a motherboard problem. My dad ( who is much better with computers than I am ) took out my hard drive and power supply and put it into a completely different computer and it powered up several times and actually worked but that was with a different set of monitor/keyboard/mouse and STUFF. He mentioned something about having two hard drives now and setting my old one as the slave...whatever that means hope it helps. So I figured that was the end of my problems. On a side note, he lives 4 hours away so it was not a cheap trip to get my computer "fixed" and I won't be able to make that trip again so I have to figure this out on my own. =/ Once I got home I booted it up it asked me something about restoring to DEFAULT settings so I hit F2 to approve it and then I was able to get into Windows. A few minutes later I got the blue screen of death giving me an error and I had to turn off the computer. And now I am back where I started. My tower sounds like it is on and running but nothing else works not even the cd. I'm sorry I don't have a lot of specific information like what kind of hard drive/power supply and all that stuff I'm not a computer guru I just play games on them I'll stop rambling and I really hope this is just a simple fix Thanks in advance! did you get a new motherboard for your computer? Quote He mentioned something about having two hard drives now and setting my old one as the slave did he install windows on the new harddrive? was this harddrive BRAND new or was it out of another computer? The mother board was new for my hard drive but not new in general it had worked in the previous computer just fine. The other hard drive wasn't new either it was my mom's old computer she upgraded I guess...anyways it had windows on it and I do not remember him having to reinstall Windows at all. Hope this helps! you will need to reinstall windows on your new harddrive for it to function correctly. windows binds itself to the motherboard so you cannot simply pop a master harddrive out of one computer and pop it in another computer (as the master) and hope it works.Have you tried booting into safe mode? I would suggest finding or downloading and burning a copy of a live CD Linux distro like Knoppix (search distro watch) and boot from the CD drive. It does not even need a hard drive to run and if it does with no errors then it would appear to be a software issue. You may have a bad memory module. Make sure they are seated securely.Quote from: daniel1212 on April 25, 2008, 02:52:58 PM Have you tried booting into safe mode? I would suggest finding or downloading and burning a copy of a live CD Linux distro like Knoppix (search distro watch) and boot from the CD drive. It does not even need a hard drive to run and if it does with no errors then it would appear to be a software issue. You may have a bad memory module. Make sure they are seated securely. thank you for the input daniel, but lets not confuse the OP. one thing at a time. if reinstalling XP doesnt work, we can delve further into details.I second Homer on this. Reinstall XP. You're actually lucky to be able to get into Windows XP at all after changing the motherboard.

Answer»

I left my computer on all night and in the MORNING it was off. When I turned it back on the tower itself was on and RUNNING but the monitor/keyboard/mouse were not on. I switched those parts ( monitor/keyboard) with a different computer's and still nothing. I thought that it might be a power supply issue but when I replaced the power supply still did the same thing. So I assumed it might be a motherboard problem. My dad ( who is much better with computers than I am ) took out my hard drive and power supply and put it into a completely different computer and it powered up several times and actually worked but that was with a different set of monitor/keyboard/mouse and STUFF. He mentioned something about having two hard drives now and setting my old one as the slave...whatever that means hope it helps. So I figured that was the end of my problems.

On a side note, he lives 4 hours away so it was not a cheap trip to get my computer "fixed" and I won't be able to make that trip again so I have to figure this out on my own. =/

Once I got home I booted it up it asked me something about restoring to DEFAULT settings so I hit F2 to approve it and then I was able to get into Windows. A few minutes later I got the blue screen of death giving me an error and I had to turn off the computer. And now I am back where I started. My tower sounds like it is on and running but nothing else works not even the cd.

I'm sorry I don't have a lot of specific information like what kind of hard drive/power supply and all that stuff I'm not a computer guru I just play games on them I'll stop rambling and I really hope this is just a simple fix

Thanks in advance!
did you get a new motherboard for your computer?

Quote

He mentioned something about having two hard drives now and setting my old one as the slave

did he install windows on the new harddrive? was this harddrive BRAND new or was it out of another computer?

The mother board was new for my hard drive but not new in general it had worked in the previous computer just fine. The other hard drive wasn't new either it was my mom's old computer she upgraded I guess...anyways it had windows on it and I do not remember him having to reinstall Windows at all. Hope this helps! you will need to reinstall windows on your new harddrive for it to function correctly. windows binds itself to the motherboard so you cannot simply pop a master harddrive out of one computer and pop it in another computer (as the master) and hope it works.Have you tried booting into safe mode?

I would suggest finding or downloading and burning a copy of a live CD Linux distro like Knoppix (search distro watch) and boot from the CD drive. It does not even need a hard drive to run and if it does with no errors then it would appear to be a software issue.

You may have a bad memory module. Make sure they are seated securely.Quote from: daniel1212 on April 25, 2008, 02:52:58 PM

Have you tried booting into safe mode?

I would suggest finding or downloading and burning a copy of a live CD Linux distro like Knoppix (search distro watch) and boot from the CD drive. It does not even need a hard drive to run and if it does with no errors then it would appear to be a software issue.

You may have a bad memory module. Make sure they are seated securely.

thank you for the input daniel, but lets not confuse the OP. one thing at a time. if reinstalling XP doesnt work, we can delve further into details.I second Homer on this. Reinstall XP.

You're actually lucky to be able to get into Windows XP at all after changing the motherboard.

Solve : Help! Confusing computer troubles :(?

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